From Walmart to politicians, from energy to gold, latest news on litecoin and Z-cash, we are covering it all and more in today’s Crypto news in a Nutshell!

My name is Dan and we do these crypto news updates regularly because we know how easy it is to tunnel vision on our favorite coins and lose perspective of the bigger market, so the next 10mins is our way to update you in a quick and fun way on the latest happenings in the crypto space. So sit back and enjoy!

1) Chile Adopts Blockchain Technology For National Energy Grid

The Chilean energy regulatory agency(CNE), has announced that it will implement Blockchain technology in the national energy grid.

The CNE will use the Blockchain to authenticate information like marginal costs, average market prices, fuel prices, and compliance with renewable energy law. The CNE executive secretary Andrés Romero stated that the move toward blockchain was done out of concern for data security.

“The National Energy Commission has decided to join this innovative technology and we have decided to use blockchain as a digital notary, which will allow us to certify that the information we provide in the open data portal has not been altered or modified and left unalterable record of its existence,” says Romero.
Romero added that the technology will increase trust in the data provided by the regulatory agency, boosting the confidence of investors, stakeholders, and the public at large. Chile plans to implement the technology in March, 2018.
Blockchain technology has proved a boon for energy companies in regulators in various sectors of the industry. S&P Global Platts recently announced they would be using deploy its own Blockchain solution for reporting information on oil in the UAE.
The WePower project has employed Blockchain solutions to integrating metering data with grid operations and advanced analytics in a effort to build ‘smart metering’. This Ethereum-based platform allows consumers to connect directly to renewable energy sources for their power.

https://cointelegraph.com/news/chile-adopts-blockchain-technology-for-national-energy-grid

For those of you who don’t know what Wepower is, it is a relatively new blockchain-based green energy trading platform. It’s ICO that only finished about a month ago, it basically provides funding for projects that want to do green energy projects and investors are rewarded with free energy they can sell for Wepower. I haven’t actually looked into the project in great detail, but from the crypto grapevine, it is a one of the new favorites with potential great gains. If anyone is interested in this project, drop me a line in the comments that you would like to know more and I will do a bit more reading and do a proper review of this project soon.

2) Politicians are getting in on the cryptocurrency craze to fund campaigns

Despite its dramatic rise and fall, bitcoin has surged in popularity this year, and many politicians are now looking to get a piece of the digital currency.

Republican Andrew Hemingway started the trend in 2014. Hemingway was introduced to bitcoin as a tech entrepreneur. At 32, he became the youngest gubernatorial candidate in New Hampshire history — and the first to accept bitcoin contributions.

New York Democrat Patrick Nelson, who is running for Congress, is also accepting contributions through bitcoin payment service provider Bitpay.

Other candidates accepting bitcoin include Democratic congressional hopeful Brian Forde of California and Republican Kelli Ward, who is vying for one of Arizona's Senate seats.

The first presidential candidate to accept bitcoin contributions was Kentucky Republican Sen. Rand Paul. The libertarian previously expressed excitement about the future of digital currency as a potential replacement for credit cards. But Paul has also voiced some skepticism, arguing bitcoin needs to have real value, and calculating this value is extremely difficult because cryptocurrencies are in an "exponential bubble."

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/03/01/cryptocurrency-candidates-politicians-embrace-bitcoin.html

So there you have it. These politicians, they are sceptical about crypto, they want to put regulations about crypto, they spread FUD about Crypto, but when it comes to funding their campaigns, they welcome crypto arms. Haha, I guess money is money, wherever it comes from. The good news is this article was from CNBC, one of the biggest mainstream news channel, so what it’s worth, I guess its another good article to raise the awareness of crypto.

3) Walmart To Implement Blockchain-Based Delivery System

The application of US retail giant Walmart to patent its “Smart Package” system has been released by the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) on Thursday, March 1, Fintech Finance reports.

Walmart’s “Smart Package” patent employs a Blockchain-based tool to track package contents, environmental conditions, location, and other details. The device described in the application is intended to be used in new technologies like autonomous vehicles and unmanned drones.

According to the application, Blockchain will record the "key addresses along the chain” such as “seller private key address, a courier private key address, and a buyer private key address."

“Smart Package” is not the first instance of Walmart utilizing Blockchain technology. In November, 2016, Walmart partnered with IBM to use Blockchain to detect and remove recalled foods from its products list.

Blockchain technology has been popular with shipping and delivery companies. The US shipping company UPS joined the Blockchain in Trucking Alliance (BiTA) in November, 2017. Singaporean port operator PSA International struck a deal with IBM to test and develop a Blockchain-based supply chain network in August, 2017, according to Fintech Finance.

https://cointelegraph.com/news/walmart-to-implement-blockchain-based-delivery-system

This is exciting news, because it means giants in the retail industry are starting to embrace blockchain in supply management, blockchain projects like Vechain and Waltonchain are most likely to benefit from such news, in fact, it is worth seeing if Walmart decides to partner with either of these two who are the current leading supply-chain management block chian projects. Haha, that’s a mouthful, “supply chain management blockchain projects.” Anyways, something to look a close eye on, especially if you’re invested in these projects, the potential of a Walmart partnership!

4) Litecoin (LTC) Releases New Core Version

Litecoin once again shows the propensity for rather stable prices, and was the best performing crypto coin in February.
The changes are mostly minor, but there are important updates to optimize block discovery and node resources. Updating to the new version is optional. One of the effects is the prevention of accidental forking by discovering competing blocks.

Other changes include a disabling of competing wallets, as users would not be able to open copies of the same wallet at the same time. Miners would be able to set block size manually as preferred. But one of the most important features was another lowering of minimum transaction fees, with a view on lowering them even further to a minimum of 0.0001 LTC per kilobyte in the next release.

https://cryptovest.com/news/credit-suisse-ing-use-blockchain-app-for-25m-euro-securities-transaction/

It’s really good to see Litecoin moving forward after the disappointing news of litepay being delayed by Visa without a date in sight. Their prices haven’t dropped and to be honest, even in their social media, the community has been encouraging each other and the Litecoin team, taking it in their stride. It was very impressive to see, and I’m really glad to see Litecoin moving forward so fast.

5) Company To Link Gold Trade Payment Methods With Cryptocurrency Techniques

Whilst not readily used in trading today, gold has traditionally been viewed as a safe and secure investment. Combining this historical method with the most modern, cryptocurrency, may not seem like a likely partnership. However, a new company is doing just that.

KaratBank claim that they take the advantages of gold trading and apply it to cryptocurrency. They highlight that gold is a trusted means of investment worldwide, is limited in quantity (which can push up value) and is also stable in price. By linking each of their KaratBank Coins (KBC) to a physical weight of deposited gold (in the form of CashGold – 24 carat gold embedded on a bank note), each token has a stable, trusted value.

So essentially, Karatbank is trying fill the shoes of USD tether. A coin that is pegged to a real live resource, is very stable with little volatility. It is particularly precious to traders during a bear run like Jan when traders needed a safe heaven to hide in. Furthermore Gold is an asset that is still rising in general (not as fast a crypto), so it would be an overall good investment if it takes off).

Reassuringly, KaratBank are in cooperation with Karatbars GmbH, (who already have an established community of nearly 500,000 users worldwide who have collectively invested $120 mln), meaning that the growing number of companies worldwide accepting Karatbars as payment will also do so with KaratBank Coin.

The pre-ICO has already begun and will continue until March 21, with the main ICO beginning March 22 (1 KBC = $0.05). By April 18, the team aim to have KaratBank Coin listed on one major exchange. By 2020, they hope to have 2 percent market penetration, and market capitalisation at $500 mln.

https://cointelegraph.com/news/company-to-link-gold-trade-payment-methods-with-cryptocurrency-techniques

6) Credit Suisse, ING Use Blockchain App for 25M Euro Securities Transaction

Switzerland’s Credit Suisse Group and Dutch-based ING Groep have successfully implemented blockchain technology in a securities lending deal worth 25 million euro ($30.6 million). The banking giants used the HQLAx securities lending application, which is based on the Corda platform provided by blockchain consortium R3.

The Digital Collateral Records (DCRs) utilized in HQLAx’s CorDapp are seen as capable of increasing regulatory transparency, reducing systemic and operational risks, and streamlining capital management, the companies said.
The blockchain-based app could cut transaction time from days to seconds, the companies noted.

Managing director Charley Cooper told Reuters:
“This was far more than a proof of concept in a fenced lab. These are regulated institutions in a real market and it is a unique demonstration that blockchain solutions are being deployed in commercial settings.”

Credit Suisse and ING anticipate that HQLAx’s application will go live by the end of 2018, Herve Francois of ING said.

https://cryptovest.com/news/credit-suisse-ing-use-blockchain-app-for-25m-euro-securities-transaction/

Another practical application of blockchain, another piece of good news for the crypto world!

7) Overwinter Is Coming: Zcash Moves Closer to First-Ever Hard Fork

Zcash has released new software in preparation for its first system-wide software upgrade.

Dubbed "Overwinter" and set to activate in June, the software finds zcash's developer team moving to fortify its technology in anticipation of future updates. Due to the nature of the code, which will be enacted via a mechanism called a hard fork, all users will be required to make the shift.

According to a blog post announcing the new software, Overwinter will include "versioning, replay protection for network upgrades, performance improvements for transparent transactions, a new feature of transaction expiry and more."

As of Feb. 27, an employee wrote on the forum that the team's "manual testing of the release candidate" was still in progress.

So that’s it for this episode of Crypto news in a Nutshell. If you like this post, do follow us, we do news updates regularly to provide you with a quick and painless way to keep up to date with the latest happenings in the crypto world. Trust me a couple of months from now, you will be so glad you kept up to date with the news, it’s just you a good feel of the opportunity and general market state that none of us can afford to miss out on as investors.

Join us tomorrow for a coin review, we still have a few coins that you guys have requested. So tomorrow we will have a look at one of those coins. We love getting requests, so if you have any requests, feel free to drop it in the comments section below and we will get to it as soon as we can.

Have yourself great Saturday! And we will catch up with you tomorrow!

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